The Federal Aviation Administration requires airports to conduct a full scale disaster exercise every 3 years. This year the exercise at Eisenhower National will be held at 9:30 a.m. on Friday, Sept. 1st.
The faux scenario for the exercise will be north of Highway K-42, in between runways 1L and 14. At 9 a.m. an aircraft declares an in-air emergency to the air traffic control tower due to an issue with the right main landing gear. The aircraft has a purported 75 passengers and crew onboard with 2,500 lbs. of fuel and is landing on runway 14 with a crosswind. Upon landing, the right main landing gear will fail and the aircraft crashes and comes to rest off the end of the runway. The exercise on how the airport and partner agencies would respond to this scenario begins at 9:30 a.m.
Disasters of this scale are extremely rare and have never occurred at the Wichita airport. In the event such a disaster should occur, airport officials say the airport would utilize Twitter to provide real-time information to the public. During Friday's exercise, airport staff will post simulated information on Twitter from their channel, @FlyICT, using the hashtag #ICTdrill.